Christmas in Colombia is QUITE a production. Its not just one or two days like here in the US and it can be exhausting if you are not used to partying constantly for a better part of some 15 days, day and night after day and night. If you think you will be spending Christmas in Colombia next year be sure to condition your liver with a serious regimen of rum training over several months. Otherwise, you will be such a light-weight that you will not remember past December 15th or so.

One of my most enduring memories from Colombian Christmases would have to be eating tamales at midnight on Christmas Eve. Even though I now live way the h*ll north of the beautiful equatorial paradise that is Colombia and far from my mom, I set out to make my own tamales this year (first time for me). I have put together a few pictures of the assembly process to help you with the how-to. Since I was shooting in the kitchen with low crappy lighting and also taking care of three kids and dealing with a delivery man, all at once, my shots are not the best here and not in great focus. I apologize for that ahead of time!

This is best done surrounded by all of your favorite relatives (preferably mamas, abuelitas, and tias who know how to do this and who have all sorts of stories to tell) so that you have help and make it all go by quickly. I had just myself!

Here is the recipe that our family uses to make Colombian tamales. There is quite a bit of preparation time, so you will need to start at least two or three days ahead of the planned serving time. This recipe should make about 20 tamales.Ingredients:

20 chicken thighs, skinned and defatted (save this. Can be rendered to crisps and schmaltz for other recipes).

20 pork ribs about the length of your finger with a good amount of meat on them. You’ll probably have to buy them as a rack and chop them up yourself. (If you don’t want pork ribs, use 20 chicken legs)

A very large crab or lobster steamer with a bottom rack and lid. Fill with salted water about 3 ” above the bottom rack.
Pique Sauce:

6 cleaned green onions

3 cloves garlic

1/4 cup of fresh lemon juice

1/4 cup of minced cilantro

1 tsp of ground comino

1/8 cup of sugar

1/2 cup of white vinegar

salt to taste

Directions:

Two or three days before:
Put the chicken and ribs in separate containers. (Or if you are substituting more chicken, you can put all the meat in one container). Prepare the marinade from the ingredients listed above, divide and put 1/2 on the chicken and the other 1/2 on the ribs. With your hands, work the marinade into the meats. Cover and refrigerate until the next day.

Saute the listed “hogao” ingredients in the olive oil until wilted, set aside.

Preparation of the “Masa”:
Corn dough or “masa”. Put 4 cups of “La Venezolana” or “ArepaHarina” in a large bowl or container. Slowly add 5 cups of lukewarm (not hot) water or chicken broth. You’ll probably have to use your hands to mix well. Most likely, you will need to add more water to get the “masa” to the consistency of cooked oatmeal or grits. This dough does not have the stiff consistency of “empanada” dough.
Assembly and cooking of the Tamales:
Place about a cup of the dough in the center of the banana leaf. Place one rib and one chicken thigh on top. Place about 3 slices each of the carrots, potatoes and egg on the meat. Spoon about 3 tablespoons of “hogao” on top of the vegetables and egg. Then spoon about a 1/2 cup of “masa” on top of all of this and gently spread as much out as you can. Now, fold the edges of the banana leaf over the filling so as to make a package. Do not let any of the filling show. If the leaf splits, just take another smaller piece of leaf and fold it around the package.

Tie up the package/tamale with the string or cord. Believe me, this tying up of the tamales in banana leaves takes practice!! After you have tied up the tamale/package, tear off a 12″ sheet of aluminum foil and wrap it tightly around the tamale. Continue with the other tamales according to the above directions. Stack the tamales all the way to the top in the steamer pot and turn up the heat to high. If your pot does not hold all of them, just refrigerate the rest until you can steam them later, or, borrow another steamer pot. When you hear the water boiling furiously, turn the heat down to medium. Always make sure that the pot is steaming and that there is enough water in it. Cover tightly and steam for at least 3 hours. After that time, remove the top tamale and open it up to make sure that the meat is thoroughly cooked. It should be falling off the bone.

Serve the tamales on a section of banana leaf. (Warn guests not to eat the leaf! A favorite Colombian story is that a Gringo was served a tamale. When he finished it he said,”Boy, was this delicious!! However, the lettuce was kind of tough!!” (har,har).

Some Colombians like to put “pique” on their tamales.
To make pique sauce:
This sauce/relish is similar to “pico de gallo” except it does not include the minced jalapeno. If you want to use jalapeno, you can, but it’s not legitimate Colombian. This relish is spooned into a bitten-off empanada or onto arepas, into tamales, etc. Yummmm! Its like a taste of sunshine!

Finely mince the green onions and the garlic. Add the other ingredients and let marinate for at least 2 hours. There should be enough liquid to almost reach the top of the relish. You may have to adjust by adding a little more vinegar.

I made enough to freeze (raw) and will see how they cook up out of the freezer at a later date!

I am making tamales from your recipe right now. I made about half your recipe and came out with about 13 tamales since my husband (Colombiano) likes it with a lot more masa than your recipe calls for (he says its his favorite part). Your recipes and how-tos are very helpful for a gringa like me.

Excellente! Wish I could come for a visit Yeah, we each have our favorite part! The masa is very delicious, especially after steaming it and cooking so many delicious juices into it. I am so very glad that my recipes and such are helpful and please always feel free to drop a note with questions or a report on how it went for you!

Oh my I am so happy to finally have this recipe. My husband is Colombian and I am Puerto Rican. I absolutely love tamales and all things Colombian. The one time I tried to make them, the water got in them and they were so soggy, I literally wasted a whole 8 hours,and I had to . I am gonna make these this weekend. Oh my Gosh, I cannot wait. Do you have an email if I have any questions? Thanks

Margarita: Excellent, I hope these work out for you! Soggy tamales are no fun. Definitely make sure to keep them well away from the boiling water.. I suggest getting the inexpensive metal steamers you can find in asian grocery markets.

I just made them and they are steaming in my tamalera. I had to double the masa and still only made 13. Maybe I put too much meat or maybe it’s cause my chicken pieces and ribs were so big. Gosh, I hope they come out good. I will keep you posted. Oh, I also added a handful of small, chopped red peppers in the masa. And i also added some chicken bouillon, sazon, comino and salt to the masa.

OK, the flavor was out of this world, but even though i steamed them, the masa was still soft. Any advice? Thank you, I am gonna surprise my mom in law tomorrow. Oh, by the way, the pique was good too.!!!!!!!! Next time I will recruit help, my shoulders are killing me. LOL

Margarita: Wow, you have been so busy! It sounds like they came out delicious.

Yeah, if your meat chunks are really generous, they may overwhelm the average banana leaf.

Glad you liked the pique.. that stuff is addictive to me. It is a HUGE job for one person, no doubt. I was wiped out myself too when I did this all alone.

Are you comparing the masa to mexican tamales or to other colombian tamales you have had? Mexican tamales can have really hard masa (which I do not get into… its pretty awful when its tough and dry .. bleh). In my experience, the masa should not be runny and also not dry. It should envelope the filling and be a bit moist from the filling and not the steam from the cooker. If a lot of water is coming form the steamer, try to find a way to prevent condensation from falling onto the tamales as they steam.

Hi, I retract my previous statement, the next day, the masa was fine. And my mother in law who is colombian, and has made tamales before, said they were very good, and her friend said that I was an expert tamales maker.
You just have no idea how good that made me feel, and it’s all thanks to your recipe. For years I have tried finding the recipe on line and I always wounded up finding recipes in spanish that I just could not understand. I speak and read spanish, but the colombian metric system is diffrent that ours here in the states.
You have really simplified this for me and I am so very grateful that I found your site. Thanks so much!!!!!!!!!!

Margarita: oh my goodness! Thats the best, makes my day to hear that it went so well for you. *cheers* My mom was the one who made all the conversions. I am going to let her know about your great outcome!

I’m a native Texan married to a Colombiano and now living in California, the only thing that I could think of to bring a little bit of Colombia to us this December was to make these fabulous tamales. I used more Coastal flavors adding some capers and olives to the masa, but my husband says they were just like the ones his mama made. Thanks for the recipe, I’ve never made them on my own before, so seeing step-by-step pics helped a lot! cheers and Feliz Diciembre, Rocky

My husband and I have adopted a little Colombian boy who is the joy of our lives. One way that we try to keep part of his hispanic background is to create Colombian meals. Christmas Eve has now become a Colombian Christmas eve meal. Our entire families…in-laws, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and friends come and celebrate with us. I love the recipe and look forward to trying the tamales. I would love Christmas traditions to share with our Oscar. He’s a bit too young to start with the rum…but we aren’t! Thanks Nika!

Hi Nika,
I’m making the tamales for the very first time and am very confident that my husband will love them. He’s also from Colombia-and said that the tamales are what he misses most growing up there. Here in Hawaii, there are few latino restaurants to choose from-I’m glad I came across your site. Thanks for the recipe!

Nika-
Thanks for posting this! I’ve made Mom’s recipe several times (every time I throw a Colombian party and the last one had 65 people!) and I’ve found a few tricks. 1. If it is for a party, make a week ahead and freeze the steamed tamales– re-heat in the steamer before the party. This can take a couple of hours b/c they are frozen, so start the re-heating a few hours early and keep an eye on them. 2. Inevitably one of your guests will ask if they can bring something to the party– ask them for help instead and schedule the tamale making for that week before. I once made 40 tamales on my own for a party and almost started crying– get help. 3. This is a little risky. I don’t eat pork and so I double the chicken to marinade. Sometimes I end up with leftover chicken so I leave the pieces in the marinade in the coldest part of the fridge until the following week (when the party is). Grill these just before the party. There is so much acid in the hogao marinade that the meat is wonderfully tender when grilled. Some folks may feel uncomfortable about raw chicken sitting for long in the marinade, but I’ve done this several times and I’m still living.

Somethig that no one has mentioned. In Colombia, there are several types of tamales, they vary by department (state). The tamales tolimenses have a lot of rice and not enough masa in them. I haven’t had the tamale santanderiana, because my favorite is the tamale antioqueno.
It basically is a good beef stew, wrapped up with the masa and cooked just long enough to cook the masa. Total time for ten tamales wasn’t much more than three hours, from me cutting the leaves, to unwrapping the first tamal.
I am glad people are enjoying the cuisine of Colombia.

That is true Geoff, there are many ways to make tamales, and the ingredients vary as much as the people of their regions. I like to add capers and olives, also I have a special recipe for aji-dulce from my Tia. But who makes only ten tamales at time??? -Rocky

Nika, thanks for the recipe. I made this for the first time for Christmas 2007. It was a hit! I am not Colombian but married to one. My husband’s family and friends were quite impressed. I think this is going to become a tradition. Tamales for Christmas eve just like how my “Suegra” remembers celebrating the holidays in Colombia.

Nika, help me out here if you can. You say to use masaarepa La Venezolana or Arepa Harina. My wife uses these for Empanadas but used a different prroduct for Tamales which says for Tamales on the side. She screwed up the Maza the seccond time. Way too hard! Does the Maza have to be in a thick oatmeal like consistency when it goes onto the banana leaf? The Tamales also have to be ABOVE the water in the steamer orr can sit in the wwater if TIED properly?

I do not want her to mess these up. She uses Goya Masaarepa for Empanadas which is the same as La Venezolana. The Goya product “made in Canada” is better than the same product “Made in Colombia” oddly enough she says for Empanadas. Same color bag and price…made in two different places.

JS: Masa Harina (masa arepa etc) is what we use. There may be other types or brands used by others but I dont know anything about it to comment on it. There is a product in the stores here in the US that is more for the mexican kitchen and they may be referring to mexican tamales but I do not know if its the same as what we use (sorry!). The masa dough should not be so thick that its like playdoh and also not runny. Maybe somewhat like a really thick grits mixture (so that is comes off the spoon ok, doesnt run, but isnt dry/too thick)

If it gets down in the water it gets nasty! Keep it up and out of the water for sure.

Crops of all sorts can be different when grown in different locations. Corn is not one breed so its likely that the corn that will grow in Canada is wholly different than the corn that grows in Colombia so its not a surprise that they would be different! Made in Canada or Colombia may also refer just to where it is ground or perhaps even just where it was packaged. The corn itself may come from somewhere else entirely. Globalization has done a real number on our food system.

Hello.. I am hungry now… i am Cachaco and was thinking of cooking some this weekend. What is interesting is the differences from this recipe to my mom’s. We add another meat, beef, use green olives, and some other ingredients not listed. We also don’t use some of your listed ingredients.. none the less.. Colombian Tamales… nothing in the world like them…

I love tamales. I grew up in Colombia (missionary parents) and this was one of our favorite foods. We had a neighbor that made a huge batch every New Year’s and she always gave some to us. The ladies at the church would also get together every so often and make gigantic batches of them.

I’ll be posting your recipe on one of my sites in case people want to try it. No use in my writing it all out and taking photos if you’ve already done a great job! Thanks!